',0' Rr) m1 . ! f. 4! V:!A , ..: ,.:, !' t :U r : .',::,'"" '::: .. ' .. ", 27' j '-{ 3r :': ' ,':: :,.-:t: '.: ." "(if ..... ...... .. .:,,::, IJP ,': 5:: ;\'::::::...,, '::" :::::, ; '" ' :.. "/;ii{:\ I.. ," ,',:, ' : . .'. . , : , ' , ' :, . : ' : : : : , ' . . , : , ': : ' ,, : : :, ' ,; . ::: '.:,"'Jt :. , . . . . " , , ', ,:. '_ ::., " ,::: : , ', , : . , : ; : ., :: : , " : : : ' :. : :, : :, " : : . , : :, \ , t.. : :: . \ :: ! . .:,, : ,, : : $. :, ' :: :: :: , : ; , ' , ; , ; : ; : : : : : :. . :,: : :,:., . , . , ,,:, , , . t t?;", _-4Æ --':. " i:;:" ':,' ',' ";'.' ',' :: '::' , ;t .."i* ., "::: :}; :::: . :. . ?:::: ; ; r J..:::.;: , : ' : ,:tr ;,.1$: " ,; q:, 'f,;" .. .r ::,". ..{,:":,, ......... :.'::.: :- ''It ::: .. :::i:: ::- :}:' ' ,,:'. oJ; r i:f :fi' ' " ...,,,,,., ; "Corporal Thomas E. Harrison writes from the southwest Pacific, 'Thank you all for your round-robin letter. It sure was interesting and I sure was surprised to get it. Goodbye now.' Private First Class Roland V. Brill writes fron somewhere in Alaska) 'Tlfl ell) it certainly was a big surprise · · .' ), she inched forward and forced her- self painfully to her feet. As soon as she was standing, she looked up and smiled at Prinz to show him she was ready to go on. His lips were moving but she couldn't hear him because of the wInd. "You don't have to take so long! " he yelled. "Get your weight forward, and this time don't. fall!" He lifted his skis off the ground and started downhill. As he passed her, his face looked dark and drawn with the cold. He was out of sight immediately. Then she could see him again, standing in the trail waiting for her. She was so cold she was glad to move but, coming down, she could feel the muscles in her legs harden until she thought they must break. \Vhen she stopped, her thighs trembled so she could hardly pull them together. Even standing still, she had to hold herself taut to keep from sideslipping. "Well," she called gaily, "I didn't fall," but Prinz hadn't looked up. He was hunched over, holding the fingers of one hand in his mouth as though he . . were trying to whistle. As soon as he saw her he put his glove on and started down again. She wanted to rest but, seeing him grow smaller, she followed and fell twice on the way. E very time she forced herself upright with her poles she could feel the wrench in her ankles and she arrived at the end of the curve staring intently at the tips of her skis through a blur of tears. Prinz was standing there breathing on his fingers. His right glove was lying grotesquely in the strap of a ski pole. He held out his hand to show her. One finger was white and strange-looking next to the others. "1 got them frozen once," he said, "and now they get numb quicker. Standing around in the cold all the time like this-" "Here, take my gloves," she said. "They're much heavier than yours and h d . " my an S are qune warm. "N 0," he said, and pulled his glove on with a jerk. "Now watch, this time I snowplow and maybe you do like I d " o. He started down, calling out as though he were calling a square dance, "Down on the right, now we turn and down"-his body swung smoothly- " h If " on tee t. Watching him move away from her in rhythmic semicircles, she felt fright- ened. Under her feet the trail was ice, and over one shoulder she could see it rising up at her back. She was trapped. There was nothing but this endless icy path and the forest pressing in on either side. Now she couldn't see Prinz and she got into a snowplow hur- riedly, saying over and over to herself, "Keep your nerve, just get low, and k " eep your nerve. The turn was wide and sharply banked. Then it narrowefi to a deep groove and she was going so fast she knew she couldn't stop Suddenly the ground came up close and she could fee] the jar as she fell. She let herself slide recklessly, with no desire to check herself. It was a relief to make no effort and she noticed how slowly the white curving snowbank and, above, the dark tree trunks went past. The whitened metal of the tip of a ski pole seemed part of the peculiar landscape,